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Hikers and runners, berry pickers and mushroom foragers, nature lovers and big game hunters are all lured to the pathway that leads to the backside of Douglas Island by the same promise: untouched wilderness. That soon could change.

ANCHORAGE - A historic Alaska gold-mining city could be the first place where the federal government invests in a deep-water port to serve vessels in Arctic waters.The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is preparing to release a study for public comment that suggests expanding the Port of Nome as a first step in improving infrastructure along Alaska's west and north coast.Nome is south of the Bering Strait but far closer to Arctic waters than the nearest Coast Guard base in Kodiak, an island east of the Aleutian Chain.

Thumbs up to the U.S. Coast Guard. On Saturday and Sunday, the Coast Guard icebreaker Polar Star came to the rescue of the Australian fishing vessel Antarctic Chieftain, which was trapped in pack ice near its namesake continent.

JUNEAU - The U.S. Bureau of Land Management issued a final decision Friday that it said will open the way for the first oil and gas production from federal lands in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska.

JUNEAU - Republican U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan was sworn in at the start of the new Congress on Tuesday, becoming Alaska's junior senator. An Alaska contingent that included Gov. Bill Walker and state lawmakers were in Washington, D.C., for the event.

Concerns over the environmental impacts of building the road out of Juneau have taken the backseat during recent discussions to safety and cost, but opponents of the Juneau Access Project say the state's preferred route, known as Alternative 2B, is "without a doubt" the most environmentally damaging of them all.